In a horrific incident that left his neighbours reeling in shock, a 56 –year- old man of Kanye village cut his penis with a knife in obedience to an evil voice instructing him to commit suicide.
Kebonyemodisa Simane from Kgwatlheng ward used a blunt knife to try and remove his manhood last week Saturday.
He also attempted to slice his throat with a sharp razor blade and used the same knife he cut his penis with to cause several open cuts all over his body until he passed out.
He was found writhing in pain inside his bedroom by a visiting relative who called neighbours to take Simane to Seventh Day Adventist hospital on Sunday morning and reported the incident to the police.
Narrating his horror story to The Voice, Simane who was found nursing fresh wounds at home, said he had just been discharged from hospital where he was treated for serious self inflicted injuries for a week.
He had several stitches on the neck, legs, hands and he pointed out that his penis, which he nearly chopped off had also been stitched back.
“I almost chopped my hands off, luckily I was using a blunt knife, so in the end I gave up because the knife was not sharp enough. The loud voice had ordered me to kill myself immediately, so I left my warm blankets to go and get a knife and a razor blade to hurt myself,” he said.
The troubled man further explained that on that fateful night he had gone to bed early and well only to be awakened by the evil voice at the devil’s hour on Saturday morning instructing him to kill himself.
“I will never listen to that voice again. When I woke up in hospital, I could not lift my legs due to the excruciating pain I had inflicted on my private parts.”
Simane’s neighbor, Ontiretse Kebaitse described him as “ a normal and well-mannered man, who peacefully lived alone because his three children were in Gaborone.
“We have been neighbours for a long time and we didn’t know him to have a history of mental illness or drug use. He has shocked the entire ward with his bizarre story. In fact the reason we reported the matter to the police immediately is because we were convinced that he must have been a victim of robbery,” Kebaitse explained.
Confirming the incident, Officer in charge for Criminal Investigation Department (CID), Assistant Superintendent Ranchi Olebile said police were waiting for the man to fully recover before they could investigate further on what could have driven Simane to behave in such a strange manner and what to do with him.
Contacted for an expert view on what could have caused Simane to hurt himself, Private Clinical Psychologist Thato Molefi says she suspects Simane might have taken some sort of hallucinogen, either intentionally or not.
Hallucinogens, Molefi says, temper with the body’s neurotransmitters and causes someone’s reality to become exaggerated.
“It is a normal reaction to hallucinogens that causes an abnormal behaviour. It is possible his inner ears were affected by a suspect substance and were unbalanced when he thought he heard voices telling him to harm himself,” says Molefi.
According to drug facts compiled by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), hallucinogens are a diverse group of drugs that alter perception, thoughts, and feelings.
They cause hallucinations, or sensations and images that seem real though they are not.
They might be found even in off the counter drugs like some cough mixtures. voice
